


First Impressions

by ActualWritesThings



Category: Star Wars Legends: Republic Commando Series - Karen Traviss
Genre: First Meetings, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-19
Updated: 2017-11-19
Packaged: 2019-02-04 09:55:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 611
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12768531
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ActualWritesThings/pseuds/ActualWritesThings
Summary: A commando and a pilot's first meeting.





	First Impressions

**Author's Note:**

> prompted by [thesummerstorms](http://thesummerstorms.tumblr.com/) who asked "can I hug you?" 
> 
> Not quite what was asked, but close?

RC 4032, although he’s also getting called Ash now -not just by his brothers, but by Vau as well- can’t sleep. They’ve just come out of a stint in the growth tanks, and he’s still relearning how his limbs work. They’re all a few inches further away than they were before the week in the tank and he’s tripped over them a couple of times. It’s annoying, but he’s already adjusting. He has to. He’ll be culled if he doesn’t. Or Vau will set the strill on him. Either way, he’ll deserve it.

It’s thoughts like this and the bits and pieces of the flash-training that’d been shoved into them during their time in the tanks bubbling up every time he closes his eyes that are keeping him. Plus he hurts, a low level ache settling into his bones, into his joints, making him desperate to move them, to shake the pain back out. All of this makes him uneasy, feeling all but trapped in the tube that is his bunk.

So he sneaks out, dropping silently to the floor and slicing the door. Easy, the same codes and programs that have been used since they were four. The halls are deserted and he doesn’t feel afraid. There hasn’t been a patrol from the minder droids in ages. So he makes his way to a small observation deck, not quite sure why his feet led him there, but mentally shrugging. It’s as good a place as any to spend the night, and certainly better than his bunk. Even though there’s a storm building and the deck’s already shaking with distant thunder.

Only for him to trip over a sleeping body. He scrambles one way, the body scrambles the other and they both stare at each other wide-eyed. They both begin to calm as they realize it’s a brother staring back at them, not necessarily a threat. Not when they’re both out of their bunks.

Besides, Ash is fairly certain he knows this vod. A pilot, one that’s been assigned to the commando groups due to lack of cohesion with his wing or something. He thinks his number’s 4046?

“What’re you doing here?” 4046 asks, crouched defensively low.

“Could ask you the same thing.”

“I asked first,” 4046’s beginning to lose the defensive crouch as he asks, still looking at Ash with caution.

“Couldn’t sleep,” Ash shrugs. “You?”

“Same. Growth jars?”

“And flash training,” Ash confirms, moving closer to 4046, feeling his heart rate begin to calm back down.

“Think I’d take flash over a week’s worth of simulations,” 4046 says.

“Solo?”

“Yeah mostly. I’m Toast, by the way,” 4046- Toast- says, settling back down and patting the durasteel next to him. “You’re Ash, right?”

“Yeah,” Ash says and he doesn’t hesitate as he sits down right next to Toast, let’s Toast slide some of his blanket to him.

“Look’s like I’m gonna be training with your squad.”

“Can you even reach the pedals in the cockpit?”

“Fuck you,” Toast says, but he grins as he does. “We can’t all be giants like you.”

Ash is about to reply when a crash of thunder, so loud it makes Ash’s chest ache, crashes through them, making them both flinch ever so slightly. Ok so maybe this wasn’t the best spot to be, but he doesn’t want to go back. “Can I-?” he lifts up his arm, to wrap it around Toast, not saying anything else.

Toast just snuggles against him, the two of them curling up around each other. When the next peal of thunder hits, neither of them flinch and Ash can’t help the feeling that this is how things should be.


End file.
